Near field optical probes have been under investigation for some time. In such probes, a sub-wavelength aperture is employed to increase resolution compared to the conventional diffraction limit. More recently, vertical cavity surface emitting lasers (VCSELs) have been considered in connection with near-field optical probes. For example, in U.S. Pat. No. 7,095,767, enhanced near field brightness is provided with an aperture in the laser emission facet of a VCSEL.
However, we have found that known approaches for integrating an aperture with a VCSEL to provide a near field source suffer from significant disadvantages, and so it would be an advance in the art to alleviate these disadvantages.